


Crimson White

by tofsla



Category: Saiyuki
Genre: Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-16
Updated: 2012-06-16
Packaged: 2017-11-07 21:07:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/435465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tofsla/pseuds/tofsla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gojyo is pretty sure he shouldn't be alive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crimson White

**Author's Note:**

> Written in 2008.

The first breath was a struggle, air burning down his throat, stinging his lungs; it left him coughing and choking, on hands and knees on the floor, water pouring off him. The second breath still hurt, but it didn't feel as though it was going to kill him, so he took a third, and a fourth.

Still raw, but he was alive.

He _shouldn't_ be alive, or in here, or naked, or soaking wet. He was pretty sure about all of those points, though right now it was hard to say where the certainty came from. He couldn't summon up many details about himself, or about anything that'd happened before. Snippets and fragments, _there's been an accident,_ sirens and shouting and someone leaning over him, _fuck, man, just hold on, okay?_ and then too much damn pain and... that was it.

Okay. Not much pain now except for his chest, and that was easing up. He just couldn't shake the persistent feeling that something was wrong.

He opened his eyes. The floor was clean and white, clinically so. His hands were pale. The only splash of colour was where his hair hung crimson-red around his face, long enough to fall across his eyes.

Wait, didn't he have short black hair?

"Why is he awake?" someone asked sharply. "We're not nearly finished fine-tuning yet. Put him under and get him back in stasis."

Something sharp pierced his neck, a little jab of pain.

The floor faded out of focus again.

 

He was sitting up when he came to, and he was dry, but they hadn't given him any fucking clothes, which was a bit low.

A neat-looking woman was peering at him over her glasses. She was kinda pretty, in a severe sort of way.

She also had a clipboard.

"Tell me your name," she said, brisk.

"What the hell?"

"Just tell me, please."

"Sha Gojyo."

"Thank you." A note was scribbled down, and her pen hovered over the page for a minute, moving here and there. "Age?"

"Twenty-five."

Another note made. "Place of birth?"

"Sector ten, East."

"The last thing you remember?"

"I... fell. From six floors up. I was working for a guy who--" Gojyo shook his head. Something red moved at the edge of his field of vision. "Christ. Six floors. Why the fuck am I alive?"

"Ah, well. That's a question I'm not fully qualified to answer, but you'll be spoken to shortly. Tell me, do you feel that your memory is quite clear?"

He thought about this. Childhood, family, friends, work, everything seemed okay. But how would he know if he was missing something? "Uh, far as I know."

"Good." The woman activated the comm device in her ear. "Everything seems to be in order so far. Would you come in now?"

The door slid smoothly open, and a man stepped into the room. Gojyo was beginning to feel really fucking uncomfortable about the _no clothes_ thing. "Look, can someone tell me what the fuck is going on?"

"You are correct that you had an accident," the man told him. "It was quite a serious accident, actually. You really shouldn't be here talking to us, let alone making demands. I'm afraid there was very little we could do with your old body, but fortunately, new techology is becoming available which... well. I assume you're aware of back-up neural records. Until recently we've been able to do very little with them, although they've been some use in legal cases, but I think you'll agree that the body we've installed you in is quite impressive."

Gojyo's mind sort of blanked. It was all just words, no meaning coming through. No meaning he wanted to admit to grasping, anyway, even privately. _You've had an accident. Just hold on, okay?_

"What are you..."

"On a purely technical level, but I believe also a legal one at the present time," the man said, way too brightly, "you are, in fact, dead."

He didn't feel dead. He couldn't even quite remember _dying_ , however hard he tried; the last thing was someone lifting him a little, fast-paced technical talk he didn't understand.

"Then what the fuck is all this?"

He started to his feet, forgetting to be selfconscious about his nakedness, angry and confused. 

"This," the woman told him, "is your second chance at life. Isn't it interesting?"

He could see his reflection in the glass that covered one wall. He looked pale and skinny, all the colour washed out except for his hair and eyes - identical, matching, unnatural crimson. He should panic now. Why wasn't he panicking?

"Why me? I'm no-one important."

"I'll be blunt." The man again. " _Because_ you're no-one important. It wouldn't have mattered if the experiment had failed. Now, I have some things to tell you about your new body, and then we'll carry out some more comprehensive tests..."


End file.
